{"id":27416,"date":"2024-12-01T06:14:50","date_gmt":"2024-12-01T11:14:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/?p=27416"},"modified":"2024-12-01T17:21:02","modified_gmt":"2024-12-01T22:21:02","slug":"george-russell-i-would-have-won-the-title-in-a-mclaren-or-red-bull","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/12\/01\/george-russell-i-would-have-won-the-title-in-a-mclaren-or-red-bull\/","title":{"rendered":"George Russell: I would have won the title in a McLaren or Red Bull"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/11\/30\/russell-im-ready-to-win-the-championship-in-the-right-car\/\" target=\"_self\">George Russell<\/a> is not shy about his ambitions of being at the very top in Formula 1. The Mercedes driver believes he is ready to become World Champion &#8211; arguing he would have taken this year&#8217;s crown in a <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/11\/09\/mclaren-constructors-title-always-our-priority\/\" target=\"_self\">McLaren<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/11\/26\/f1-news-red-bull-not-confident-about-2025-package\/\" target=\"_self\">Red Bull<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h2>George Russell analyses 2024 title fight between Verstappen and Norris<\/h2>\n<p>After dominating the first few rounds of the year, Max Verstappen spent most of his 2024 campaign on the defensive.<\/p>\n<p>As McLaren, Ferrari and Mercedes made improvements, Christian Horner&#8217;s team went through a long period where their upgrades were ineffective.<\/p>\n<p>Luckily for Red Bull, <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/11\/03\/norris-after-verstappen-brazil-win-its-not-talent-its-just-luck\/\" target=\"_self\">Verstappen<\/a> managed to optimise his RB20 and secure the necessary results to win. At the same time, Norris and McLaren threw away plenty of opportunities to close the gap.<\/p>\n<p>From George Russell&#8217;s perspective, it was poor execution from McLaren that allowed the Dutchman to claim a fourth world title.<\/p>\n<p>When asked if he could have won the title in McLaren&#8217;s MCL38, Russell responded without hesitation:<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;Yes, absolutely,&#8221;<\/em> he told the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailymail.co.uk\/sport\/formulaone\/article-14141091\/George-Russell-Lando-Norris-McLaren-Max-Verstappen.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Daily Mail<\/a>:<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;Max has won once in the last 12 races, so he is very beatable.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;The difference is that when Max has had the chance he has won, whereas his rivals who should have beaten him this year did not.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;They [Norris and McLaren] have thrown away a lot of points. And therefore Max, who is an exceptional driver, has won the championship early.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;I say I could have won in the Red Bull because it was the quickest car at the start. Even Checo was second a few times.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;It\u2019s only in the second half of the season that they were the third best team.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a id=\"oK9hJac-Q-1OG8TYGSBFHA\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/2187064638\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'oK9hJac-Q-1OG8TYGSBFHA',sig:'X-SR0G_KwvJgDyiXe4H-5OELHIVdtcqzzkEOYGK0jiA=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'2187064638',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n<h4>Next year will be critical for Mercedes<\/h4>\n<p>With George Russell taking a second consecutive Pole Position in Qatar, Mercedes seem to have overcome their mid-season slump.<\/p>\n<p>Assuming they can carry this year&#8217;s momentum into the W16, <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/11\/13\/f1-news-mercedes-reveal-priorities-for-2025-package\/\" target=\"_self\">Mercedes<\/a> should be fighting for victories from the first round in Bahrain.<\/p>\n<p>For Russell, who joined the Silver Arrows just after their dominance ended, next year could be his first chance to realistically target the Championship.<\/p>\n<p>Then again, there are still plenty of obstacles to overcome. The first challenge will be on the opposite side of the garage, with the highly anticipated <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/11\/19\/kimi-antonelli-i-want-to-beat-russell-next-year\/\" target=\"_self\">Kimi Antonelli<\/a> joining Mercedes next year.<\/p>\n<p>Elsewhere, there are three other teams who are can realistically target race victories and even the title in 2025.<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps Russell&#8217;s hopes are best reinforced by the idea that &#8211; as F1 enters the final year of these regulations &#8211; teams are struggling to find improvements.<\/p>\n<p>Therefore, it is relatively unlikely that anyone will make a significant step forward next season.<\/p>\n<p>In this context, Mercedes will be part of an intense multi-team battle for the crown.<\/p>\n<p>This is the kind of scenario where <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/11\/24\/russell-its-about-time-someone-gave-verstappen-a-proper-fight\/\" target=\"_self\">George Russell can prove the extent of his capabilities<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>George Russell is not shy about his ambitions of being at the very top in Formula 1. The Mercedes driver believes he is ready to become World Champion &#8211; arguing he would have taken this year&#8217;s crown in a McLaren or Red Bull. George Russell analyses 2024 title fight between Verstappen and Norris After dominating [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4927,"featured_media":27417,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,3],"tags":[2220,465,66,121,2411],"class_list":["post-27416","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-formula-1","category-news","tag-2024-formula-1-season","tag-f1-news","tag-mclaren","tag-mercedes","tag-russell"],"modified_by":"Jaden Diaz-Ndisang","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27416","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4927"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27416"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27416\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27417"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27416"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27416"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27416"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}